Orphan.
The voices whispered in her head, illusive echoes of the wind.
Foster care...
Delinquent.
They set her mind adrift and into the past. Adolescents without guidance fell under merciless criticism, often under the wrong pair of eyes. The difference between peer pressure and parents was that peers lacked the luxury of hindsight, and hindsight was never a luxury.
"It will loosen you up..."
Thanks to a white slit between the leaves, Jessica maintained a clear view of the sidewalk. Between classmates, she stood incognito under shaded bushes, one among a group of four teens in red skirts and white sleeves. Every shirt bore a distinct gold and red triangle, School of Albion stitched. Far behind the evergreen nook lay the academic terrace: three classroom floors and three wings folded into a U around the courtyard. Behind the structure resided the overgrown garden, where students spent their recess and after-school leisure.
The brunette beside Jessica repeated, "It will loosen you up." Her smile was lazy, her green eyes drooping from fooled exhaustion. She brandished a piece of tine the size of a matchbox, with syrettes inside. "And there's more where that came from if you keep it crisp."
Giggling, two other girls reached across Jessica to pass the tiny instruments. She didn't need any, however, because she already held one. Even in her grasp, the pink contents were a mystery.
"So, what is this called?" she said with a grimace.
"It's called, 'Do it, Jess.'"
Too bad her friends were never clever. A chance to laugh every now and then wouldn't have been so bad, but high school never paved the way. A tug on her shoulder brought her mind back; another classmate: brown eyes, brown skin, blonde dye, and a toothy smile.
"Mesnomer is literally a trip," said the girl. "For you, it can do wonders, Jessica. Like, stressing over work all the time, like, the lame teachers. Like, your parents. You need this."
"Mirk, shut the fuck up!" said the blonde on the far-right.
"What?" Mirk said dumbly, then nearly rolled on Jessica's thousand-yard expression. "Oh..."
The green-eyed brunette slogged on Jessica's other shoulder. "All you have to do is try it. And if you like it, come to me – My dad has it just lying around. But shh..."
Maybe I should try it. Every second chipped at her will. What do I have to lose?
Mirk squealed blissfully in Jessica's ear, the girl's head reeling upward with a smile wider than normal. She had taken another dose, a look of pleasure secreting from her pupils. Like she was someplace else.
That's all that mattered. It came down to nothing more and nothing less than being anywhere other than where she was. Away from the present. Away from reality.
Low footsteps suddenly knocked on the curb. At first, the girls were unfazed, cloistered in leaves.
"What are you doing in there?" they heard.
The brunette shut the drug case. "Fuck!" she whispered. While the natural blonde, still in her right mind, grabbed Mirk from the ground and dragged her away. Jessica stayed.
It was still in the palm of her hand, the Mesnomer. Some random person on the sidewalk was of no concern. Shrugging, she rolled up her sleeve.
"Why don't you come out of there?" the voiced resumed. An old lady voice. Old lady voices had the natural and ultimate tone of authority. "I've got my camera out. I'll record you if I have to."
The threat annoyed Jessica to no end. People annoyed her. That nosy character driven by rules, no matter how stupid—people who didn't mind their own business and took pleasure from punishing others—annoyed her. She clenched her fists at the tapping feet beyond the bush and stormed out.
"Why don't you mind your damned business!"
Indeed, it had been an old woman on the other side. She was a pleb in her fashion: a teal blouse, white pants, and a six-sided silver star dangling beneath a yellow scarf. Grey hair spread over wrinkles on a sprightly white face whose blue eyes, somehow, looked older than the rest of her.
"Could it be that class is over?" said the upbeat lady, indicating the school.
Jessica's resentment was on display. Up and down, she scoffed at the red, white, and green Tacquizza bag in the lady's wrinkly hand. She wanted to make fun but would settle for coldness. "Class is in session."
"In a manner of speaking?" said the lady.
"I don't see a phone."
"Because there isn't one."
Jessica rolled her glare then whirled in the other direction. "I have to go."
"And what are you going to do with that?"
It wasn't long before she realized where the old lady was pointing. "With what?" she said coyly.
"The Mesnomer in your hand."
Jessica turned back around. The lady was clever. Cleverness was uncommon in her adversaries. She lifted her fist then revealed the syrette in her palm. "I'm going to use it," she taunted.
"May I ask why?"
"You going to report me? Drag me to the dean so I can be paraded? Then expelled because drugs are bad for me?"
"The presumption here is that I am some self-righteous old woman with a blind deference to rules, regardless if they make sense or not."
Jessica's head jerked back, the old lady's intrigue was rising to quadruple digits. "Yea, well, deference is the norm, yea?"
"Let me school you on something," the lady started, with a tone of hell about to freeze over, "and I hope that you'll listen." It was an image of mundane magnificence as she let her Tacquizza bag down and adjusted her top. Political ambiance suddenly propelled her new poise as she lifted her arms with gestures to accentuate every word. "I do not believe an education system that relies on deprivation as punishment should exemplify moral authority." She rolled her queenly fingers. "It is a gross perversion of pedagogy to wrap any cluster of young people in a space and tell them that their age makes them sheep.
"Do you understand me? Worse, only a flawed system would abandon the rest to failure based on their behavior. So, the first step..."
Jessica felt like the audience to some grand political speech. Vexing, but no adult had taken her seriously in a long time. Everyone had a bottom line, so she waited until the end, if for no other reason than to discover comes next.
"So, what do you want from me?" she said.
"The answer to a question."
Jessica shrugged.
The lady lifted her shriveled finger, revealing burn scars, and pointed at the Mesnomer. "Is that who you are?"
She had forgotten about the drug, yet instinctively clenched it against her shirt. "What's it matter?"
"It is a simple question. Will you answer, or can you not answer?"
"I..."
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